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The Peckham Symphony Orchestra....otherwise known as the police siren chorus whenever West Ham come to Millwall. Norman Beaton was so deadpan. I think Victor Meldrew could have been based on Desmond Ambrose!!!

His character in Empire Road was quite a conservative unable to move with the times sort of chap, I think he was called Everton Bennett but his tenants knew him as Mister Man. Wayne Laryea was in it too and I remember him as the only human character in 'Pipkins', made by ATV in Brum.

Getting a roof leak that has caused my ceiling to collapse finally and properly plugged up with a Tegelen roof tile. Now to replace the tyorn felt with bitumenous flashboard aided with a little No More Nails. This is a major weight off my mind. Never mind Pharrell. This calls for....

Finding Rowan knitting yarn greatly reduced in price in Jenner's today. Needless to say, I had already paid full price for other yarn in John Lewis. Since when did it cost £25 for five balls of yarn for baby clothes? Knitting is now considered a hobby rather than a necessity.

Oh, and I am knitting baby garments for a gift. I'm officially too old for baby nonsense

Finished off the plasterboarding and taping up the joints today. I put up the new pendant light fitting and drilled the pilot holes to screw the fitting into once the muck goes on. Day off tomorrow then compounding the joints on Monday before insulation in the loft.

I'll post a photo when I get time, but it's good that I've reached this milestone. Yes we have had some rain and my roofspace is as dry as a bone.

Not quite - there's not yet any insulation above the boarding. The lagging hadn't been correctly installed, ie the top layer sat on the joists rather than being crisscrossed. Also the joists are all queer sizes rather than all at 40 or 60cm, so will have to go up there with my crawlboards up and measure up.

I also had a substantial electric shock yesterday, not as much as 230v as the light did not operate and the circuit was turned off but I think given the way we are wired up, we need to turn the whole lighting circuit off before I replace the next light fitting. I thought isolating a circuit meant just that. I think I can manage the compounding in the morning...

I had a fantastic joint yesterday evening of something beginning with 'M' that really fulfilled my satisfaction. Not only as it's been many weeks and months since I've had one or been able to afford one

Finished insulating my new ceiling. I have 40cm of lagging to keep the 11 month long English winter away from it. Today it's clearing up, wash my work gear and on Monday, the plastering begins in Ernest.....

All it is really is buttering toast. Today I did the finishing coat. Very different to using bonding coat, this stuff is much less porous so it sets in double quick time and has to be smoothed down regularly but it smooths down well with lots of water and the trowel marks disappear as it dries (or 'goes off' as plasterers tend to say). You're supposed to put 2 of these finishing coats on but I think the ceiling only needs one.

So that's another milestone, we start the walls on Monday, 2 of them need to be replastered.

Not been going to Keep Fit for a while due to the plastering and feeling jaded all of the time as a consequence, but being told 'that was very nice' by one woman after a little piano recital (that I played quite well with only a tiny amount of slipups)

I'm definitely not playing the organ, which will be played by none other than the organist of L'pool Cathedral!!! (owes a few favours to Father of the Bride, who is a tenor in the aforementioned choir) BUT daughter did commission me to write the wedding march, which is nearly done. She said she wanted Here Comes the Bride but one of her own, and I played it over the phone to her and her dad this afternoon (not quite finished yet) and they said it sounds like a wedding march, so I must be doing the right thing. It's a bit corny - er, cheesy - er, trite - no, I have it, it's a bit RETRO! Sounds rather like something written by someone trying tno to write the Russian National Anthem.

The daughters are threatening to come down in May and drag me off to John Lewis to get The Outfit, not to mention The Hat. Daughter is an atheist but somehow they found a church which didn't mind (Unitarian)

I didn't do much to ensnare the bridegroom, she met him in the pub after work a couple of years ago, just emerging from a really dysfunctional relationship with this African nurse, and he's from Liverpool where she lived and trained, so she's now back there, not wanting to start a family in London. So I might also find I'm going to be a grandma ovedr the next year too (needs to get a move on, she's already 38)

Will try to write some more soon, I'm permanently knackered since husband retired in late September and promptly began on a slow downward spiral of short-term memory problems and general absent-mindedness. Buying the puppy has helped - she's now 6 months and all legs; not going to be enormous because although mummy was a full-size labrador, daddy was allegedly a miniature poodle (must have stood on a box). She's known severally as Dirty Gertie from Number Thirty and Muffy (from Muffy Little Scrutt, a rather nice spoonerism). Far too much energy, enormous feet, steals the cat-food and everybody loves her.

Still have about 40 pupils. Average getting younger and younger and more and more Chinese. ABRSM exam tomorrow afternoon, two Trinity exams the next Saturday, and four LCM exams in April, of these seven, one English, four Indian, one Polish and one Latvian.

Saturday Indian Indian Indian Indian English/quarter Maltese German/half Chinese and finally Half Malaysian (x2)

My best one is gradually heading to grade 5. My most frustrating one though I like her a lot is probably the Wednesday adult, who managed to show me something she was really proud of this week and I had to tell her to throw it away. She'd drawn a stave with a treble clef and labelled the notes. Unfortunately she also wrote "on line" and "line through" against each of the space and line notes respectively and then labelled CDEFG correctly followed by the second space being another C and on upwards as though it was a bass clef. We've been through this week after week after week. She's 70

Keep on cheesing off Nigel Farage with that international mix of students, Ghislaine. Try saying hello in Polski to your Pole: czezc, roughly pronounced ch-ay-sh-ch. The away with the fairies student sounds like a person after my own artichoke!

Well, that's my second wall all done. Break tomorrow for piano lesson and then it's four days from Wednesday to Saturday to get as much as I can get done done before my wife is off next week. We were thinking of going to Oxford but down the A44 from Worcester through Evesham, Broadway and Moreton in Marsh, which is a lovely run through the Cotswolds.

Still got some plastering to do but small areas - however however large or small your job is in terms of area, you still have to spend as much time cleaning your tools, buckets, floor, carpets (where you walk to the bathroom water supply) the bath, sink, carpet in bathroom and then finally yourself.

So it's a gap between the cupboard door jamb and the wall which I will fill with scrunched up pages of The Guardian (what we mean by a Liberal dose of filler) and then bonded, along with the remaining bits of plastering. After that, what plastering still needs to be done can be taken care of with patching plaster - therefore drastically cutting down the clean up time.

I've also been preparing for the next job, replacement of the uPVG window sills and sealant. The darrens that did it (as you can expect) did it cheaply rather than properly as the sealant they used wasn't mould resistant - as I found out not long afterwards!

Despite yet more ill health from my wife (our wedding vows were in sickness and in severe sickness) and having to drive her to health centre, pharmacy, work (for sicknote) and Aldi which meant getting stuck in worsening Birmingham traffic queues, getting every last square cm of plastering complete and doing a thorough springclean of the room ready for the next job, preparing all the surfaces for painting, otherwise known as sanding down, commencing on the 23rd.

I really am too cream crackered for piano practice tonight and I know I'm not going to be able to move in the morning.

Nice run up to Nottingham where I found a couple of specimen g3 theory papers in Musicroom, and a music copy of Ancient and Modern Standard in mint condition for 99p in Oxfam Books and Music.

The edition is published in 1924 but the reprint cannot possibly date back that far. It is in such good condition it doesn't even LOOK to have been printed before 1970! Pity it doesn't specify an ISBN or specific details. There's a words copy on Amazon with a very similarly conditioned hardback cover printed 1982.

If they were all in C then I might have a go. But the Paul Harris ventured into G and it became too much for me. Don't forget I have this awful habit of assuming every single piece of music is in Cmaj then I play it until it sounds awry. THEN I try to play the black notes. Now you know why I'm such a poor, erm, er, thingummybob. It's what Markymark would have called a 'bad habbit'.

I took a trip into Edinburgh and picked up a pattern book for the yarn I purchased a couple of weeks ago. Now I have an excuse to use the new posh needles I bought at the Edinburgh Yarn Festival last weekend. Yes, I am a knitter